Mozilla drops EULA requirement for Ubuntu

September 23rd, 2008
by matt

Groklaw reports that Mozilla, after the negative reaction from the community, has decided to forego having the next version of Ubuntu display an End-User License Agreement upon first use of the Firefox browser.

Here’s a screenshot of the latest language from Mozilla, and as you’ll see, they absolutely have listened to the community’s EULA concerns (if you click on the image, it gets larger). Instead of a EULA, the new page you get on install is a notices page with no “I agree” requirement, along with a link to an optional services agreement, and instructions there on how to avoid having to accept the services, if you don’t want them. The notices inform you about the license being the MPL, that Mozilla’s trademarks are theirs, not ours, and the link to the services offerings. I believe trademarks are important to protect, as you probably know from reading Groklaw.

This is far better than an EULA, especially because it both addresses the real issue at hand (trademarks, not copyrights) and because it exists in a human-readable short summary.

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